Inner Workings

It has been a whirlwind week here. I've not gone anywhere, really. I've pretty much only gone shopping for necessities- like food. The children kept saying there was nothing to eat around these parts, so I decided to humor them. :)

I have spent the week organizing my abode. It has been kind of odd- in a nice way. :) The odd part comes in the fact that I'm not going through things as I'm packing boxes and preparing for a move. Packing boxes has been my stand-by way of organizing/thinning out items. You see - our family's move into this house was our 15th move in 15 years- all averaged out. I could like not moving. :) In a few months we'll have lived here longer than we've lived anywhere since we've been married. We've been married for nearly 18 years.

My foray into all crevices of the house began with an innocuous event. Free bunk beds. I like free. I really like free. What a blessing and an answer to prayer! They were immediately designated for the boys room as it is the smaller of the 2 children's rooms. But- work had to be done. To set up the bunks I had to remove the mattress our 7yo was sleeping on and the captains bed our 17yo has had for eons. The captain's bed moved to the girl's room for our 14 yo as we needed more drawer space for the girls...and as an extra blessing to me- dd cannot shove all manner of things (or anything!) under her bed. :) This thrills me to no end!

So the captain's bed moved to the girls room. Mine and my husband's dressers moved to the boys room, and we were able to ditch the inefficient dresser our 7yo had. (I loved the old dresser/desk combo- but I loved it much more before ds took a scalpel from older ds's dissection kit to it. ~sigh~ ) My dh had the brilliant idea to give the boys our dressers and buy ourselves dressers we liked and that better reflected our taste. Since I was dealing with beds and clothing in the boys room and mine- I decided why stop there? I moved onto the cabinet where the boys store all manner of personal items. After measuring the boys cabinet I took a trip to Wal-Mart and found plastic storage bins (that all matched in lid color and shape!) to allow for more efficient storage compared to the few bins they already had. I made sure to buy bins that all have hinged lids so the lids could always be found. :) I love the results!

Getting things organized and cleaned out in the boys room was such a treat I decided- why stop there? On I went to the 3 hall closets, the 2 entry closets, and all of the kitchen drawers. Somewhere in the midst of this I also organized every.single book we have. Replacing the dressers in my room necessitated the removal of a bookcase (Yay! More clutter banished!) in order for the new dressers to fit. I had to order new curriculum for next year for the younger children which required space ...and all the books were a disaster anyways.

And then... then there was the matter my desk. ~sigh~ It took 2 days- but it is now cleaner and more organized than it's been since the baby (who is now 1.5 yo) arrived. I feel invigorated! A cluttered house and desk make for a cluttered mind. I'm beginning to think I was more 'snowed under' with the arrival of our 5th child than I realized. The fog is beginning to lift! I see sunshine peeking through! And it's lovely. :)